


Waiting

by RandomSlasher (Randomslasher)



Category: L4D2 - Fandom, Left 4 Dead 2
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-25
Updated: 2013-11-25
Packaged: 2018-01-02 14:12:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1057740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Randomslasher/pseuds/RandomSlasher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nick waits with an injured Ellis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waiting

I pushed myself up, just far enough to see over the partition. It had been quiet for the last ten minutes or so--almost too quiet. It was making me nervous. That's the bad thing about adrenaline: it makes anticipation so much worse. Inactivity had become something I loathed almost as much as the zombies.

I settled back down, and glanced at my charge. Still propped against the side of the building. Still awake, for now. But his head was drooping, chin to his chest, and his eyes were closed. He'd lost his hat in the last fray; he looked strange without it, almost naked, but I was glad for it at the moment, because it meant I could see his face. The only reason I knew he was conscious was the furrow between his brows, and the way his right hand was gripping his wounded left arm.

"C'mon, Ellis," I said, reaching forward to grip his shoulder, anxiety swirling in my stomach. "Stay with me, man. Stay awake, okay?"

He sighed, but opened his eyes, reluctantly, looking up at me. "Tired," he said, petulantly.

"I know you are," I said. "But you can't sleep yet. Stay with me."

He sighed, but nodded, leaning his head back against the building. But his eyes remained open, trained on me and half-lidded and glazed.

I let him. If he needed a distraction, the least I could do was provide it. I sighed, closing my eyes and leaning my head against the concrete partition behind me, trying to ignore my own distant aches.

"Hey, if I'm not allowed to sleep, you ain't either."

Ellis' voice drew me back from my reverie, and I blinked, looking over to see him giving me a half-smile, eyes still glazed. I returned it half-heartedly, shifting so I was sitting down instead of crouching. My knees really weren't up for long periods of sitting like that; I cringed as I straightened them out. I was really too old for this shit.

"I wasn't sleeping," I told him, pulling my rifle into my lap and checking the cartridge. Not full, not by a long shot--that tank had taken a lot of our resources. But I could probably hold out long enough for Coach and Rochelle to get back with health packs, at least.

Assuming they make it back, a treacherous voice whispered in my mind, but I forcibly ignored it. That wasn't a possibility I was willing to consider yet.

"Nick?"

I looked back up at Ellis, and saw his eyes had drifted closed. In the growing dusk, he looked pale, and a fine sheen of sweat had broken out over his face, though whether that was due to blood loss or pain, I couldn't tell. Still, I knew he had to be hurting. A handful of pain pills wasn't gonna touch what that tank had done to him.

"Yeah, Ellis?" I said.

"You got anyone...you know, waiting for you?" Ellis asked.

I frowned. "Waiting for me?"

"Yeah, you know," he said vaguely. "Family, friends...a girl?"

I couldn't help snorting softly. Yeah, right. "No," I said shortly, hoping to discourage further conversation--at least along that particular line of questioning.

You'd think I'd've known by now that Ellis never could take hints. He opened his eyes, regarding me. "Did you...lose someone?" he said, voice sympathetic.

"Hardly," I said, resigned, shifting my rifle in my lap and pumping a round into the chamber. "I don't get to blame this one on the zombies, I'm afraid. I've been on my own pretty much since I was a teenager." I'd always considered it an advantage, too, especially when this shit came down. I didn't have anyone to worry about but numero uno; I had no one to mourn, or to watch suffer as they succumbed to sickness or injury.

Ellis coughed, the sound rattling in his chest, and I cringed, sliding around and moving until I was sitting next to him, bracing him against the wracking. "Easy," I murmured, rubbing his back until the fit subsided, not liking how badly he was shivering. "Are you cold, Ellis?"

"Maybe a little," he mumbled, shrugging as he leaned heavily against me. The night wasn't exactly balmy, but it certainly wasn't cold; he was probably going into shock.

Maneuvering carefully, I eased him away just far enough to slide out of my jacket, before drawing it around him, covering him as much as I could with the stained fabric. "There you go," I murmured. "That should help."

"Thanks," he said, resting his head against my shoulder. I could feel his breath skating across my collar bone, shallow and a little slow, but steady enough. I eased my arm around him, drawing him in more firmly to my side to try to share my body heat. Dammit. Where were Coach and Rochelle?

"So you don't have anyone at all?" Ellis said after a few seconds.

I glanced down at him with a frown. I probably wouldn't have let the conversation continue, under normal circumstances, but since the distraction was helping keep him awake, I decided to humor him. "Not really, no," I said. "I knew a couple people in town, but no one I'd really call a friend."

"What about your family?" Ellis said, sounding strangely distressed.

I shrugged the shoulder he wasn't leaning against. "Mom's dead," I said. "Haven't seen Dad since I ran off after high school." Hadn't missed him, either, but the whole drunken beating thing had probably been a factor there.

"No brothers or sisters?" Ellis asked. "Cousins? Aunts? Uncles?"

"None that I know of," I said, reflecting ruefully that that was true for extended and immediate family. Dad had cheated on Mom every chance he'd gotten; for all I knew, I had a whole slew of half-siblings running around out there. "Why's this so important to you, anyway?"

"I just...I don't like thinkin' about you bein' all on your own," Ellis said, shifting a little closer to me. "It ain't right."

"Why not?" I asked, honestly bewildered that he should care. He barely knew me; why should it bother him that I was alone?

He shrugged. "Just...seems sad, that's all," he said. "You don't have anyone waiting for you. Worryin' about you, wondering if you're okay, hoping you make it."

"I hope I make it," I said dryly.

"Well, yeah," he said, as if that were obvious. "So do I. I meant it was sad you didn't have anyone you were fightin' to get back to, that's all."

I considered this. To be honest, I hadn't thought that far ahead. It was easier to focus on things in the short term--get to cover, get to the next safehouse, get to the next evac station, find food, find water, find supplies. A single day could feel like weeks, and trying to think about actually making it to one of the rescue camps felt like trying to see eons into a distant future.

But assuming we did make it--and that was a big assumption, but assuming we did--what would happen? It hadn't really occurred to me, but the others probably did all have people waiting. Coach had mentioned a wife, at one point, and Rochelle talked about her brothers. And Ellis...

Well, Ellis had his buddy Keith, and probably a whole slew of friends and relatives besides. He was the kind of person who always had people in his life; one of those people who attracted others, drew them inexorably into his orbit and held them there by his natural gravity. If I were to be honest with myself, Ellis had caught me up a long time ago. But it hadn't ever occurred to me to wonder just how many other people I was up against for his attention.

What would happen, if we finally made it out of this nightmare? Would the bonds our little group had forged survive?

Or would we drift apart, finding them to have been transient connections borne of nothing more than simple desperation?

I certainly hadn't expected to forge any at all. I hadn't expected to stay with the others in the first place; Coach had convinced me I stood a better chance getting off that building alive if I did, and after...well, after, things had just been happening too fast to think about making my escape. But now...now, I realized I didn't want to. That I actually cared about what happened to these people. And it stung to realize that sentiment might not be returned.

Dammit. I wasn't the one who was supposed to have gotten all soft and mushy, here.

"Nick?"

I looked down again, realizing I'd gotten quiet, and found Ellis watching me curiously. I gave him a tight smile--the best I could manage. "Sorry," I said, shifting and trying to get more comfortable as I struggled for an answer that would satisfy him. "I don't really know, Ellis. To be honest, I hadn't thought about it." Then, unable to keep myself from asking, I added, "I suppose you've got someone?"

Ellis nodded. "Well, yeah," he said, as though it should've been obvious. Silly me. "I mean, there's my buddy Keith, of course, and my folks, and my sisters--I have three, did I ever say that?--and then there's my buddy Dave, and Parker, and Jeff, and Billy..."

"So basically everyone you've ever met," I said, wincing when my voice came out a little peevish. But geez, this wasn't a people's choice award competition.

At least, not a close one.

"Not everyone," Ellis said, missing the annoyance in my voice, or ignoring it, I wasn't sure. "But lots of folks, yeah. And I know probably not all of them made it, but..." he shrugged. "It's nice to know at least some of 'em probably did. And that they're waiting for me."

I swallowed, looking away, wishing Coach and Rochelle would hurry the hell back. I didn't want to listen to this anymore. "Yeah," I muttered, hating myself for the way my throat had gone suddenly tight. Shit, I couldn't let this get to me. So I was alone; what else was new? Nothing had changed. I'd just let myself get too close, that was all. It didn't matter in the long run.

Except it did. Because as soon as we got there...that'd be it. Ellis would go back to his horde of friends and relatives, and I'd become just another story for him to tell when something struck his memory. D'I ever tell you 'bout the time me an' this guy Nick had to fight off a whole horde of zombies with just a baseball bat and a crowbar?

"Nick?"

"What, Ellis?" I sighed, feeling weary.

He slipped an arm around my waist, and sighed softly. "I'd be waiting for you," he said. "You know...if we'd'a known each other, before all this."

I blinked, looking down at the top of his head where it was resting against my shoulder, surprised. "You would, huh?" I asked. 

He nodded. "Yeah," he mumbled, his arm around my waist tightening marginally. "I would."

I swallowed, surprised at how moved I was by the simple, honest words. "Well...thanks, Ellis," I said at last, giving his shoulders a gentle squeeze.

He nodded again, and I could feel him beginning to drift a little. This time, I let him. The worst of his bleeding had stopped, and at this point, it was probably best to let him conserve energy in any way he could.

I shifted a little, adjusting my hold on him, turning so instead of leaning against my side, he was nestled sideways against my chest, half in my lap. I adjusted my jacket where it still covered his torso, tugging it up over his shoulders. He stirred slightly, and I shushed him by wrapping my arm more tightly around him. "Easy, buddy," I murmured. "I got you. Just rest, okay?"

"Okay, Nick," he murmured, and I listened as his breathing evened out, growing slower but remaining steady. 

We'd get through this, one way or another. And when we did...well, we'd have to play it by ear, anyway. It wasn't like things could ever go back to the way they were.

As I glanced down at the young man resting so trustingly in my arms, I decided that maybe that wasn't such a bad thing, after all.


End file.
